23rd of July 2025: Morris’ Myotis
Today’s a very brief look at a bat of moderate size: Morris’s Myotis (Myotis morrisi). They are considered to be of moderate size and were first described in 1968 [1].
Aside from their appearance, we know that they forage at a moderate height of around 1-3 metres, are found in dry scrub regions in Ethiopia and Nigeria [2], and… that’s about it. There have been two of them ever captured, with research papers mentioning them only to say that they know nothing about them [3], and the IUCN reasonably classifying them as Data Deficient [4].
The image above is also the only observation of them on iNaturalist, and it’s from 1968, of the one captured with a mist net over the River Nile, who would go on to be the first scientific record of this species [5].
Sources: [1] [2] [3] [4] [5] [Image]